The War for Profit Series Omnibus (39 page)

“Okay,” said Spike, “now how about that alternate landing strip?”

“Oh yeah, I almost forgot. Myung Jin will construct an alternate landing strip outside the crater, as specified in the original contract. We’ll use that landing strip to get off this planet, so once we’re out of the crater, we can be out of there for good. We’re even building a downtown along side its passenger terminal, so that our entertainers won’t be stuck down in the crater with the indigs. Anyway, the indigs want to take over the downtown area in the crater and bring in their own people.”

Spike said, “Well the EugeneX people aren’t actually indigs.”

“You know what I mean.” Galen stood, the staff stood. “All right, anything else? Dismissed.”

It had been tedious, the past two months, getting the Brigade out of the crater, but the process was complete. Galen stood in the security control room at the top of the tunnel and looked out the transparent armored window that faced the gaping tunnel entrance. A single skimmer came out, the driver and Vehicle Commander seated in the front, the laser gunner behind the weapon, Tad and Karen in the back seat.

The control room supervisor, a Sergeant, said, “That’s it, Sergeant Major. All our personnel and equipment are out of the crater.”

“Good. Thank you, Sergeant. You’re doing a great job.”

Galen left the control room, went down the stairs and exited the reinforced concrete structure that was the left wall protecting the tunnel entrance and walked over to where Karen’s skimmer was parked. “Welcome to the land of dust and wind.”

Tad said, “Well I hope it’s worth it. I was getting pretty comfortable down there.”

Karen said, “My corporate apartment was nice.”

Galen climbed over the tailgate of the skimmer and said, “I’ll ride with you over to your new ops center.” He sat on a duffle bag, recognizable as Tad’s from the markings on it. The skimmer took off toward the alternate landing strip’s terminal building. Galen looked around at the berms. The Hellcat tanks were gone, replaced by Hercules tanks. Galen saw his own tank, his sleeping area behind it a simple inverted half pipe of metal two meters high in the center. He’d attached corrugated metal to the front and back, and installed a door and window at each end. His bed took up almost half of the interior space; the bed was too comfortable to leave behind for the indig who moved into his old room.

The terminal at the air strip was a low, simple building made from material salvaged from the EPW camp. A control tower stood beside it, its skeletal metal support frame and the adapted guard tower shack at the top showed that it was, indeed, a secondary, alternate landing strip. The only craft on it was the Command Jumpship, standing near the end of the tarmac, off to the side without a hangar. There were no hangars. But it met the requirement of the contract, and was adequate to facilitate the Brigade’s departure from the planet.

Galen remembered the business class from the academy, the lesson about the relative value of compensation to the troops, and knew that if he kept them under austere living conditions for more than three months before they left Juventud, their pay would seem like an insanely generous amount of money when they got back to Mandarin, and the simple barracks on the Brigade’s home world compound would seem like a palace in comparison. The way a payee perceived the value of any compensation, both monetary and non-monetary, was always a relative matter. And for this contract, the shares for the troops would be generous in comparison with all but the most elite mercenary units.

The skimmer stopped in front of the terminal and Galen and Tad dismounted. Karen tossed Tad’s two duffle bags down to Tad and Galen, and then told the driver to take her to her ALOC track. To the right of the entrance, Tad’s TOC command post vehicle was parked butt-up against the wall, its ramp lowered to stick through an opening that was cut out for it.

Galen opened the entrance door and held it for Tad. “You’ll like it up here. We have the run of the whole place. And the shower house is only fifty meters away.”

Tad looked around at the inside. The floor was a collection of pavestones pushed into low-grade concrete. Toward the air strip, the entire wall was non-ballistic clear plastic, little scratches making it opaque in places, distortion making the view through it unclear. “Lovely.”

Galen led him to a thin door. “This is your room. Your ops chief is in the next one over, and your staff is in the two rooms across the hall. These would normally be the administrative offices for people running a spaceport.”

Tad looked inside his room and chucked his bag on the floor. Galen handed Tad’s second bag to him, which he tossed in as well. “Moving in was never so easy.”

“Well I’ll leave you to get settled in.” Galen left the terminal building and began his three kilometer walk back to his tank. He walked past the metal buildings of the ‘ville, the new party district built near the terminal, since the troops could no longer visit the downtown area of the crater. It wasn’t bad, and resembled a typical frontier town. Four bars, a snack stand, two junk food restaurants and a full-D theater, and the brothel, a two-story structure built to the same specifications as a hotel; a cheap hotel. Downtown in the crater had also been handed over to the EugeneX indigs and they brought entertainers from their own home planet to work there.

Galen’s wrist chronometer buzzed a message from Chief Koa,
We need to talk
.

Galen turned around and jogged back to the terminal. Inside he saw Tad and Koa and Tad’s driver/ops center operator standing inside the TOC command post carrier. Galen took two strides to step across the lowered assault ramp and stood inside. They shifted a bit to make room for him. Tad pointed at the flat screen above the terminal.

Koa said, “Check this out. It’s a news feed from inside Seventh City.”

Galen saw a parked vehicle smashed by a truck, both vehicles burning. The view swung right and two men were restraining a woman who kept biting their arms. The view swung left and a solid line of Legion troops the width of the street approached, stepping slowly and deliberately, armed with police riot gear. They subdued any civilians that didn’t get out of their way with numerous strikes of their clubs, then used disposable hand cuffs to hog-tie them face down and left them for follow-on troops to pick up.

The scene changed to a view from inside a store that had bars and ballistic glass over its entrance door. A mob, a mass of people pressed against the glass, the frame of the door showing weakness against the sheer force of the large crowd. Finally the door and its frame gave way, flattened to smack down like a fly swatter. Then the scene went black. Another shift in scene to an overhead view, grainy and monochrome.

Koa pointed at the letters at the bottom of the image. “According to that, it’s from a security camera mounted on the top corner of the bank building in the center of town.”

A tightly-packed mob filled three streets, gradually spreading to fill the fourth street leading away from the intersection. In the distance, it was possible to discern an organized line of people blocking the street.

Galen said, “Zoom in on that.”

“I can’t. It’s just a news feed,” said Koa. “But I can turn up the sound.”

“Okay.”

An uneducated young male voice, “…what’s going on, just so many people acting stupid, walking around biting people, it just don’t make no sense.”

Another voice, and older female, “Well I just hope they get this mess taken care of before too long, I want to get home but I’m not going out in the streets, and anyone who’s listening, I need to say, you need to just stay where you are, the streets are not safe.”

Galen said, “Okay, turn the sound back off. Those morons don’t know what they’re looking at any more than we do.”

Koa muted the sound. “Well, I’m still waiting for Sevin to get here.”

Tad said, “This in no place to talk. Let’s get the stage set up.”

By ‘stage’ he meant the external display that normally would have been set up in the domed tent extension of the TOC track. Since the assault ramp was lowered into the foyer of the air strip terminal, they hung the screen on the wall and set the control panel on a field desk next to it. Tad and Galen moved half a dozen chairs from the passenger waiting area to the foyer, facing the screen in a half-circle. Karen’s skimmer stopped out front and she and Sevin dismounted and entered the terminal.

Karen said, “What’s going on?”

Tad said, “Have a seat and I’ll show you.” He motioned to his troop, “Play it again.”

Sevin and Karen sat and watched, Sevin looking down, trying not to laugh. Tad and Galen also sat, the news feed going on the longer they watched. The line of Legion troops that was trying to stop the mob from moving down the street was pushed over and walked across by the slow-moving mob, some of the Legion troops seen trying to stand up. Then a few mob members surrounded a Legion troop and began biting him. The scene shifted away to another mob pressing against the barred gate of a private residence. Sparks showed that the gate was electrified, but the mob continued to press. Finally the gate’s left side hinges gave way and swung open on its right side hinges. The mob pushed on, slowly, shuffling forward.

Sevin stood in front of the screen and faced the viewers and said, “Okay, here’s the deal. That EugeneX youth serum has turned people into zombies.”

Galen stood. “Damn it!”

Tad drew his right index finger across his throat and his troop turned off the screen.

“Okay, I need to think,” said Galen. “I really need time to think. I’ll be back. Get this shop set up, call in all the Chiefs and above, I’ll be back in an hour. And do some research on zombies and put together an emergency public service announcement for those people in Seventh City, their news people are a joke. But don’t broadcast it until I have a chance to review it first.” Galen looked down, hands on his hips. Then he shook his head and looked up. “Sevin, come with me, we need to talk.”

Galen and Sevin left the terminal and walked together, away, out into open land around the tarmac. They walked slowly, going nowhere in particular.

“Sevin,” said Galen, “can we do this or should we contact fleet right now and get the hell off this planet?”

Sevin said, “Yes, and no.”

“What kind of answer is that?”

“Yes to the first part, we can do this, and no, we should not flee. Never run from a fight you can win.”

Galen looked down as he walked. “Besides that, is there any other reason to clean up this EugeneX mess?”

“For the good of the troops, and let me explain that. They will grow older and wiser and they will look back on this day. Over time the truth will come out about the zombie breakout here, and our troops will look back and realize they had an opportunity to do something about it but instead were ordered to run away. That will lay heavy on their consciences, haunt them all the way to their deaths.”

Galen said, “So we’re going to wipe out the zombies regardless, that’s the deal. I got that. Now it’s my responsibility to figure out how we can make some money from this.”

Sevin smiled. “Yes. Shake down GasAir for a few credits. EugeneX will be bankrupt soon, their shareholders wiped out, the bond holders will fight over the remaining assets and your claim against them for the remaining payment due for this contract will be at the back of the line, buried in court for years. Then you’ll get nothing.”

“Well they paid half up front, and they’ve made three of the four additional quarterly payments. And they paid in full already for Operation Short Circuit. We’re not losing much.”

Sevin said, “But you can’t expect our troops to fight zombies just for the hell of it. You have to pay them something.”

Galen said, “Oh, I’ll get something. EugeneX holds clear title to this planet. Maybe I can get it before too much news gets out about the zombies.”

“We need to train for three days to get ready. Seems like dawdling, but it’s necessary. The troops need to fully understand what they are up against and how to deal with it. Anything else would be irresponsible.”

“You are correct, sir.”

Sevin said, “Please, don’t call me ‘sir.’”

They turned and walked back to the landing strip terminal. Neither spoke on the way back, certain they understood each other.

When they entered the terminal, the foyer had been transformed into a full-blown operations center. The full-D screen had been moved so that it was between the ramp of the TOC track and the main entrance door. Four command terminals with their own flat screens were on desks along the wall to the left. In the center of the room was a large table with a dozen chairs around it, the command chair at the head, facing across the table to the full-D screen. The chairs around the table were already filled with Sergeant Majors and Master Sergeants. Some more Master Sergeants and Chiefs milled around, talking quietly and trying to stay out of the way for the most part. Cables running along the floor were now hidden under rubbery floor mats that locked together at the edges, making a relatively smooth floor.

Tad sat in the command chair. Galen walked over to his side and placed his hand on his shoulder. “You did one hell of a job here.”

Tad pointed at a Sergeant seated at a command terminal who was typing furiously, absorbed in a complex task. “He did it. The way he was barking orders, you’d think he was the Ops NCO.”

Galen said, “Well since you’re actually the ops O, then he is the Ops NCO.”

Tad said, “So what’s the deal?”

“We’re going to train for three days and then we’re going to wipe out the zombies.”

“You got a contract already?”

“Not yet. I’m going to use this time to shake down some payment from GasAir, and get as much as I can from EugeneX.”

“Well good luck and God bless. What’s the program for training?”

Galen waved Sevin over. “Sevin will tell you. I leave you in his capable hands.”

Sevin stood to Tad’s left and began his briefing for the crowd of key leaders. “Okay, listen up; it’s time to get his party started. We’ve already got a head start on the most important training, taking head shots at close range. The next phase of training involves target identification and conservation of forces, which can be one hundred percent if we do it right…”